


dark skin and dust covered hair (with a love for oranges?)

by tobioiisms



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Falling In Love, Immortality, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, idk what to tag this as basically its an immortality au, keith was a prince and lance is a vagabond at first, lance and keith are both immortal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-19
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-25 13:23:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9822497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tobioiisms/pseuds/tobioiisms
Summary: a story about a boy who would follow another for millions of years. literally.





	

His name is Lance.

Keith doesn't know much about him other than his appearance and the way he always manages to saunter his way into his life. His immortal life that quite literally had no end despite his fall as a prince in Korea centuries back. And here he was now as a merchant in Rome. It wasn't ideal, but Keith needed to fit in. He was no longer a prince and, in a way, he preferred it like that. The princely life was too...stuffy for Keith. He didn't want to rule Korea, not in that dynasty when everything was so corrupt and fragile, but he didn't want to cause everyone he knew the greatest of sorrows by "dying." He still was unsure of how he was still alive so far in the future. He couldn't _remember_.

Back to the point, though.

It's the height of the Roman Empire and the entire city bustles with some sort of constant need. There were overwhelming amounts people who needed things and, as a merchant who sold food, Keith was constantly dealing with heavy amounts of business. The surroundings were dusty, too crowded, and far from Keith's taste, but who was he to be picky? Learning Latin was not so exciting either, especially considering that it was a language that was incredibly different from the Korean language that he was brought up learning as a child. Nevertheless, fitting in was key.

That being said, Keith also has to deal with plenty of bandits, vagabonds, people who were just generally either too lazy, too weak, or too incapable of work. They would try and steal food from him time after time again, and it had gotten to the point that Keith was practically a genius at stopping these people by now. Most people would leave him be after a try or two, but it seemed like there was always one who was as stubborn as they came.

Again, his name was Lance. This vagabond who constantly came by his shop day after day again to try and steal the same damn fruit every single day. An orange, it was an orange. Apparently Lance liked those, or maybe he just wanted some kind of attention from Keith. Either way, it got on his all of this nerves all at the same time. It was a miracle that he even kept coming back, especially after Keith watched for him like a hawk watched for it's prey. Talk about balls.

"You can come back when you can pay," Keith barks back to the dark skinned boy, the one who ever so confidently comes back to him every day and holds the same orange in his hand like he can just walk off with it without getting throttled.

"Oh, but you're such a pretty face. I'm a pretty face too. Can't I get a discount for that?" He's leaning all over the counter of the rickety cart when he says this, like he could possibly sway Keith with his charms after all this time. _Not_ happening.

"I don't see what appearance has to do with anything. Besides, you're trying to take for free. Getting a discount isn't going to help you any." Yes, it sounds harsh, but Keith has too many actual-willing customers waiting behind this vagabond who apparently just wants to...flirt? Keith doubted it was genuine in the first place.

"I'll be back tomorrow~!" Lance chimes over his shoulder after placing the orange back down, knowing for a fact that he couldn't stay long before Keith chased him out of the entire marketplace and into the nearby ocean to drown. It was oddly attractive to see Keith angry, but Lance didn't dare utter those words to him. There was a certain kind of anger that was hot, and getting your neck wrung wasn't one of them.

Keith watches Lance as he departs, but only for a second before he returns back to the task at hand. It was strange really, the fact that Keith could think of Lance so easily even long after he's left. Half of his brain was taken up by the fact that he needed money, that he needed to fit in, while the other half of his mind swirled with question after question relating to tanned skin, ocean colored eyes, and chocolate hair. It was frustrating how someone so cocky and infuriating could stick to his mind like someone had glued him there.

Maybe his charms were more powerful than Keith wanted to admit to himself.

* * *

It's late in the night when the crowd begins to die down, the surrounding Romans knowing that the day was coming to a end and that the marketplaces would be closing down sooner rather than later. Even Keith's food cart had to close, for he needed time to sleep, to eat his own food, and prepare for the next day. He admittedly yearns for this time every day because he's not a people's person. He never has been, really. It was a miracle that he had been next in line to be a prince in Korea, especially due to the fact that his attitude was so awful. Korea must've been desperate.

He sometimes sat there and wondered what Korea did after he left, but not in a cocky manner. Despite his arguments with his father, Keith did love him. He was far closer to his mother, but...both of his parents were important to him. It was possible that they mourned, or perhaps they didn't. Perhaps they were so desperate to avoid fall that they just appointed Keith's younger brother as the next prince in command. It seemed awful, really. Keith would never know this, though.

Keith has these thoughts while the moonlight casts a bright color down on his cart, specifically his cart, and helps him organize his foods back into their proper crates. He tosses the foods that are looking to be rather poor in condition and then places the lids back onto said crates, beginning to carry them back into his small home. Keith doesn't dare risk leaving them out here, especially when there was someone like Lance on the loose.

And speaking of Lance...

"Need some help, pretty boy?"

Great. He was back. Just when he had rid his mind of him hours before. Keith turns his head and sends some sort of half glare towards this vagabond that can't see to leave him alone, crate heavy in his hands, and he tries to ignore just how appealing Lance's help sounds in that moment.

"I've done this every day of my life, I think I can handle it." Well, not every day, but every day of _this_ life.

Lance waits until Keith reappears from inside the house before walking around the cart to grab at a particular crate as if Keith had asked for his help with words. Had there been some look in his eyes that was giving away just how much he actually did appreciate that Lance was willing to offer? Keith hoped that he wasn't so readable or fragile. Perhaps Lance was just trying to annoy him, something that didn't particularly surprise Keith. After all, that's what the other had been doing all this time.

He takes a moment, a concrete one this time, to just look at Lance. Keith has to admit to himself alone that Lance is actually rather attractive. He hates that it's the truth, but he is. The white robes that adorn his frame are practically see through, and Keith has to silently wonder if that's on purpose, and they almost appear to be robes that are for women compared to what was normal of masculine attire. He carries a blue sack that hangs over his shoulder and it's the only piece of attire on his body that's not white with the exception of his chocolate brown sandals.

The white looks good against his skin because of how dark it is. Keith doesn't have a clue where he's from, but his skin is so...dark. It's truthfully amazing how it appears to have no blemishes or bruises, not a single flaw. It was impossible for a human to be so beautiful, yet so strikingly annoying in personality. His dark hair is truthfully chocolate, but seems more like a tan shade with the dust that adorns it from constantly spending time in alleys and the like. A boy with dark skin and dust covered hair.

It's then that Keith realizes that he has spent far too long admiring this boy who's now smirking at him in some sort of all knowing manner, his head whipping to the side as he grabs the crate out of Lance's hands with a jerk, going back inside of the house to place it on top of the other one. Oranges. Of course he picked up the oranges crate.

Coming back out, Keith sends some sort of mixture of a scowl and pout at this boy that he's spent far too long looking at, wondering just when Lance decided that he could worm his way into his brain like some kind of virus.

"Why are you here anyway? Don't you have a home to go back to?" Keith bites then, arms crossed against his half-bare chest, a hip sticking out against the red robes he wore.

"I'm here to see you," Lance replies smoothly, obviously playing some sort of game with him at this point.

"Yeah, I got that. I meant...why do you keep coming back? Why am I so special? You don't do this with any of the other carts."

There's a pause from Lance after Keith asks him this and Keith genuinely doesn't expect it. Had there been some sort of line that he'd crossed? Lance didn't look upset. Either way, why would he care if Lance was upset?

"There's just something about you that I like. I don't know, I just get a feeling when I'm around you. A good one, I mean. I don't know..." Lance trails, fingers shyly coming up to brush against the nape of his neck, those ocean filled eyes looking at everything that wasn't Keith. It's just the two of them now, but Lance speaks in a quiet voice like someone was listening to them. It made the atmosphere change, and Keith could feel it.

"You don't feel anything when you're with me?"

It was such an interesting inquiry. Sure, Keith felt something, but it was far more annoyance, irritation, and negative feelings than what Lance was talking about. But what he felt earlier while looking at Lance...that was not negativity. In fact, that was most definitely positive. Keith knows that it was forbidden to love another man at this time, let alone looking at one in the way that he had, so perhaps pretending that he felt nothing was the safer idea. But...Keith was never exactly one to follow the rules if his rebellious behavior as a prince told anything about him. He couldn't tell Lance about that though, not a chance.

"I feel...pretty annoyed when you try and steal my food without paying," Keith starts with continued crossed arms, eyes flickering up to look at Lance with directness. "But...sometimes I look forward to seeing you. Don't take that to your head though, it's not like we're friends."

"Then do you want to be friends?"

It's another long silence and Keith knows that he's awful with making correct time with his responses, but he can't believe he's having this conversation. He hasn't gotten close to anyone in this time period, especially considering that the marketplace life was quite a fast paced one. The only reason he even had a home was because of the fact that he needed somewhere to stay while he was here in Rome, but Keith had a feeling that heading East would happen again sooner rather than later. Becoming close with something would only result in heartbreak, and if it didn't happen because he'd moved East, it would happen because he was immortal.

But...when Lance asks him that Keith feels warm. He feels a new wave of emotion all over his skin and it's unfamiliar to him, but he has a feeling that it's wrong. To love another man was forbidden of the time, and there was no guarantee that Keith did love him, but love was an umbrella term. Interest, feelings, even the slightest bit of romantic intention was trouble. Keith could be killed, Lance could be killed, and Keith just hoped that he could push such feelings away before they consumed him and became suffocating.

"Yes," Keith utters before he even realizing it, agreeing to a friendship with a dark skinned boy who only came to steal his oranges and harass him every day. It was a friendship that Keith looked forward to though, and perhaps he would be more friendly with that in mind. Not too much though, it was still stealing.

Then a grin splits across Lance's face and it's so wide that it looks like Lance's mouth is about to crack in half. It's toothy and bright, surprisingly something that only makes feel Keith warm and good. It's not cocky compared to all the smiles he's shot towards Keith in the past, and he finds himself having to hold back a smile himself. Yeah, so much for resisting Lance's charm. He feels like he's betrayed himself.

"Hold on a second," Keith says before dipping back inside of his small home to grab at the oranges crate, lifting one from the stack before putting the lid back on and turning on his heel to give it back over to Lance. He places it in his hand softly and gives him a look. It's almost like a pact, like the two of them have bonded over an orange. How ridiculous.

"Here. Take it. It's the only one you're gonna get for free, okay?"

"I think I charmed you more than you'd like to admit. Thanks, pretty face."

"It's Keith. Don't push your luck."

"Keith....thanks, Keith."

Lance goes home after that and Keith feels consumed with thoughts of him from the night, his chest burning in a way he knows will only lead to disaster and he finds himself wishing that he'd never met Lance. Not because he didn't like it, but only because it was disastrous.

* * *

 

After that night, Keith and Lance spend the next three months together, Lance sometimes staying longer and visiting him throughout the short lulls of the day. He began to memorize the entire routine of Keith's busy schedule, of when the marketplace was at it's highest and when it was at it's lowest, and Lance finds himself visiting more often than not on the nights that he can drop by. He has to wonder how much time Lance takes out of his day just to visit him, and he would feel bad if he couldn't help but feels incredibly selfish for Lance's attention. Keith sometimes wonders how it got to this level.

But it's the first day of the fourth month that Keith finds out that he has to head East, just as he's thought. They're giving him a week's time to pack up, get rid of as much product as possible, and to prepare themselves for a trip that they wouldn't come back from. It was a long, long travel and it was unlikely that Keith would ever see Lance again. Lance would have to come with him, and it was impossible for that to happen. He had a place here in Rome, and that place wasn't with Keith. They were just friends, nothing more, and Keith wished he didn't have to admit that it was more than that despite the risks.

He waits until two days before the departure to tell Lance, and telling him was just awful. He feels his chest burn as he tells him that day to come that night because it was important. The look on Lance's face told that he wasn't exactly the best at hiding his emotions, and Keith didn't feel like he was hiding them all that well in the first place. It hurt, really.

When Lance comes that night, Keith feels himself standing too close to Lance and he has to move back so that he doesn't give the wrong idea, although it's more than the right idea to Keith. "Lance, I...I've got some bad news. There's news that several of the carts here are going on a trip East. We're going to have to be there and it's a huge trip, something they'd apparently been planning for months. It's...it's something that we won't be able to return back from. They don't expect all of us to even make it."

Lance looks distraught as he tells him this, and Keith aches because of the entire situation. He knew it would come to this, knew that he would have to leave Lance, and Keith knew that he should've pushed him away harder. This was only painful for the both of them.

They exchange a few words and Keith, surprisingly, delivers him a hug. He tells Lance that he doesn't want him to meet him at the docks, not because he doesn't want to see him, but because it'll be harder that way. Lance, of course, doesn't listen though. It's the morning of the departure and Lance is practically tripping over his robes to see Keith, something that, just as he thought, would make it harder and harder for him to deal with.

"There's something I want to give you," Lance says with an object in his hand, and Keith feels himself aching, wishing he had the heart to push that look away.

"...What is it?" he breathes, clinging onto the few things that he was bringing with him on the trip, along with the hopes that he would survive the trip in the first place.

Lance places a small chest in his hand, almost a jewelry box size, and gives him some sort of half hearted smile, "It was my mom's. I want you to have it to remember me. I know you said you'd never come back but...I'll be here."

It breaks Keith's heart that he'll wait for so long for Keith's return when it's likely that the two of them won't live past the age of thirty, but he doesn't dare tell him that. Lance is the one who won't be living past thirty, not Keith, and he ignores the feeling of hope that Lance is immortal as well solely because it was impossible.

"I can't take it. It was your mother's, don't you want to remember her?" Being closest to his mother, Keith understands this more than anyone else.

"Take it. Please. I'll always remember her, but you may not always remember me."

Keith doesn't have much time to argue, so he just hugs Lance close to him and takes the small chest in his hand, eyes slipping closed as he tries to understand why he's vowing to himself return. He's immortal, not immune, so if he dies on this trip...it'll be over for him, but he wants to come back. He wants to see Lance again, despite the fact that he will more than likely be dead, and he wants to fuel this need. Perhaps it will make him ache, perhaps he will regret making such an impossible trip back to Rome. But maybe...just maybe if he was immortal...Lance could be too.

"Good luck here in Rome. Think of me."

* * *

 

It's centuries in the future and Keith has faked his death many times now. It's happened time and time again and Keith knows that this is destined to be the rest of his life. Despite the centuries though, Keith still remembers Lance. It isn't because of the antique box that Lance had given him, although that was a contributor, but it was the fact that he couldn't leave his mind. He constantly was on his mind, the promise that he would come back West and visit him always there. It seemed ridiculous that this promise was still in mind identities later, centuries later when Lance couldn't possibly be alive, but Keith couldn't shake the feeling. He had to travel back to Rome and at least get this off of his mind. It was impossible not to.

When Keith returns, this identity is a vagabond so it seems more realistic for him to travel around so willingly. He steps off of the boat and onto the dock to search the entire city, one that has changed but...Keith still somehow feels like he recognizes it all even though it's been so long. As he travels throughout the great city, Keith begins to notice that he's seeing flyer-like pamphlets of Lance's face all over. It makes no sense, really. It's not until he reads the Latin that follows them that Keith understands. Lance was a prince. He's a prince of Rome.

How could he go from a vagabond to a prince? The bigger question was...how was he alive? Was it possible that he could be immortal? Or were these flyers just old news. They looked brand new though, even for the dust that coated the edges. It was far less dust than Rome could give, though. Keith would know this better than anyone. As he searches the area, looking for some kind of clue that this was fake, that Lance wasn't actually alive despite all the signs that told it, Keith finds his answer. It's not a bad answer, though. In fact, it's a direct answer that Lance is alive.

For a moment he thinks he's hallucinating, and then that Keith is just seeing someone with a striking resemblance. But then it hits him in his mannerisms, his smile, his action, that Lance truly was alive. It makes Keith smile like a dope without even realizing it. It's when Lance spots him that his heart stop though because of the look in Lance's features. He's stopped talking to the surrounding people, who have now started to look at Keith in complete curiosity, and he explains to them briefly that he has some catching up to do. Keith can read his lips from the distance between them. He doesn't need to hear it, he just knows.

When Lance approaches, Keith stops breathing. He's somehow taller, more beautiful, but Keith wonders if that's just his imagination. All the feelings that would corrupt him come back and Keith wonders how in the world one man could make him feel like suffocating so easily. It seemed quite literally impossible, but Lance did it with such ease.

"Lance...it's me...it's Keith..." he breathes in a soft tone, not enough that the bustling crowd would be able to hear them. He didn't want them to hear anyway, it was far too dangerous.

"You're...you're not a relative? It...it can't be," Lance replies almost hysterically, his fingers grasping at his head looking for some kind of rational explanation to all of this. There wasn't one. There never would be.

Keith grabs at Lance's wrist and pulls him into a nearby alley so that they can speak, despite the fact that it might be more suspicious that way, but the crowd was too much. They stare at each other, barely touching one another one the forearms as if it were fake, like their own illusions would disappear into thin air with the slightest touch. But neither of them disappear and it makes them want to touch another more, bringing bright smiles to one another's faces.

"I'm immortal. I've always been. You were too...?" Keith breathes out at Lance, hardly able to talk from how much he was smiling. He'd never smiled so much in his entire life. It had felt so so good to be this happy.

"Always! I can't believe it, Keith. I was hoping you'd come back, but I thought it was in vain..."

They smile at each other and their foreheads touch before they even realize it, but they pull each other in for a hug as a substitute, knowing this was more acceptable. Something happened with that conversation, something good, and Keith can only feel amazing with each second that passes. He's wondering how he got so lucky to feel this way towards someone who was also immortal. The fear slipped through him for just a moment, and Keith knows that it would come back sooner or later, but he had forgotten it then. Things were good, Keith was warm, and he had Lance.

"I have something to give back to you," Keith utters, putting his hand in his back to give the antique box Lance had given, a smile on his lips as he handed it to him.

And it's then that Lance smiles back, the softest look on his features as he begins to feel more and more warm with each passing second, and he pushes the box back into Keith's back, just as stubborn as he always was. Just as stubborn as he would always be.

"Keep it."

**Author's Note:**

> this is based off of an au a friend and i discussed for like 2 days straight. im so so invested in this au i would honestly die for it and this is only a small part of what we discussed. thanks for reading ! sorry if there are mistakes bc i guarantee there will be at least one


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